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Apparently a quote from Robert McNamara can't get through the censors...
FARGING REAGAN WANTED TO WIPE AMERICA OUT . . . AND SCOTT >>>L I K E S<<< THIS ABOUT HIM!
thebinxster,
Yes, to me that makes Obama a coward...
obama has done a brilliant job of putting members of congress out there to catch flak for things he is attempting to get done.
first, baucus was the bogeyman.
then senator nelson.
then blanche lincoln.
now joe lieberman.
and of course, rahm emanuel is always handy to deflect attention from the president. old rahm can always be blamed for anything the president is actually trying to get done.
thomm has finally come to the truth of the matter: these people have only been doing obama's bidding and he has ended up with exactly the bill he has wanted all along.
he just didn't want to take the hit for advocating for obviously regressive policies that lots of people will loathe, once they find out about them.
obama's problem all along with this: he's been a co-conspirator with all of the above-mentioned all along.
his biggest problem has been that he has been trying to keep his fingerprints off the murder weapons so that he can maintain plausible deniability.
Speaking of Vietnam, I've just finished Robert Strange McNamara's "In Retrospect."
Referencing the 10/21/67 protest at the Pentagon (http://www.savevid.com/video/washington-102167.html) McNamara wrote:
"The front ranks indeed included many troublemakers, who used every devise to provoke the troops to violence. Young women rubbed their breasts against soldiers standing at attention with rifles at their sides and even unzipped their flies; the soldiers did not move."
Could such a conciousness recognize a peace feeler from Hanoi?
mathboy,
Yes! Absolutely! I always wish those things would be said.
I have a suggestion. When one of Thom's free-marketeer guests says "Government doesn't work," Thom should throw it back in their face by saying "If government fails to serve the people, it's because of the legalized bribery called lobbying, which is brought about by a lack of regulation of corporations."
And the current states of health care and of the health care bill are proof.
DDay,
Maybe you don't have a good plot if the protagonist doesn't have a counterpart --- an antagonist.
The fact that Thom gives special treatment to conservatives who call in, seems strangely similar to the special treatment that the blue dogs receive from Obama and Reid. I understand that their participation helps add interest and fuel to Thom's show, but, it still seems somehow wrong to my egalitarian values.
The White House phone is busy, so I sent Obama an email telling, in no uncertain terms, how disappointed I am in him and his DLC politics.
I feared that Obama would land in my naughty list of HYPOCRITES this holiday season. I still have some faith that he will listen to us, but we need to be more informed than ever, and WAKE THE F UP!!!
Speaking of the Clintonistas, Lanny Davis has been supporting the coup in Honduras.
Yeah, change we can believe in. The change I believe in is the two cents left in my pocket.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24195.htm
Is Joe Lieberman Protecting Israel?
By Robert Parry
December 16, 2009 "Consortiumnews" --- Sen. Joe Lieberman’s latest threat to scuttle health-care reform – vowing to join a Republican filibuster to block an over-55 buy-in to Medicare, a proposal that he has long championed – is raising questions about his motives. But no one is mentioning the unmentionable, the cause that has come to define Lieberman’s career: Israel.
Is it possible that Lieberman’s obstructionist behavior doesn’t relate to Connecticut’s insurance industry or to his political ego – the two most cited explanations – but rather to a calculation that he can use his leverage on health care to limit the pressure that President Barack Obama can put on Israel to make concessions on a Mideast peace plan?
more...
It is interesting that Sen. Sanders is forcing his fellow senators to listen to the entirety of his single-payer bill, but no matter. Obama and his fellow Democrats are taking Bill Clinton's "advice": It doesn't matter if you pass a substantive health care bill--the "appearance" of one is "sufficient." Anyways, I find it a bit hypocritical for Thom to go half-cocked on an individual or an issue, and then criticize other people for talking about it.
Former Gov. Howard Dean showed yesterday that he is not only a man of uncommon courage and wisdom, but one who puts the welfare of his fellow Americans before his own personal interests. Defying conventional "wisdom" which parrots the notion that this is our last chance in a generation to secure health care reform, he has advocated the scrapping of this crappy excuse for reform being put forth in the Senate and regrouping to take another run at it in the next 24 months.
I think it would be interesting if the few brave progressive Senators would take a page from the 4 to 6 obstructionist blue dogs and insist on their primary needs for a public option and/or expansion of Medicare to be included or their votes will be withheld. What is there to loose? At least it would serve notice that the needs and aspirations of progressives are just as important, (if not more!), as those who sell their souls to the highest bidder. More importantly, it would send the message that some Democrats still have the spine and the will to remain tough and principled when defending the common interests of the American people. That example has been absent for far too long. Russ, Al, Sherrod, are you listening? Time to get a pair!
It has probably been observed before, that the opposite of progress is congress...
Return to Glass-Steagall
Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) are presenting legislation to put back the regulations included in the Glass-Steagall Act (decimated by the Clinton Administration.) Video:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31510813/#34446293
Senate rejects low-cost drug imports
By ALAN FRAM (AP) – 17 hours ago
WASHINGTON — The Senate has narrowly rejected a plan to allow Americans to import low-cost prescription drugs from Canada and other countries.
The amendment by North Dakota Democrat Byron Dorgan failed on a 51-48 vote. Sixty votes were needed to prevail.
Importing prescription drugs for personal use is a violation of federal law. Dorgan's amendment would have lifted the ban, allowing access to low-cost medicines from developed countries where the government limits drug prices.
As a senator, President Barack Obama supported drug imports, but his administration now echoes the objections of the pharmaceutical industry that it would cause safety problems.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i7pIgy2ugWrNRwWJXRsdLj...
Joseph Lieberman (I-Douche) is not the problem; Lieberman is only the face of the villain. Max Baucus (D-Health Insurance Industry), Mary Landrieu (D-Wal-Mart), Ben Nelson (D-Corporate Hand-Jobs) are not the problem. These jack_holes are a symptom.
The ‘Progressive’ members are more of our problem. Yes, corporate media shuns them and allows them no access to the public BUT they have no voice because they fail to exercise their voice. Yes, they are working towards a goal BUT they are also low-balling their goals then compromising and ceding those goals away.
Maintaining an ‘Progressive’ oriented voting record is not enough. There is no whisper campaign. There is no grandstanding. Other than Bernie Sanders, where is the clarinet forceful expression of the Progressive ideals?
I understand the argument for incremental/marginal change. Every nibble towards the righteous is a nibble towards the righteous. I , also, recognize that Recessivists wield a clumsy and heavy axes to hew away any and all attempts to provide strength to our democratic republic or preserve our common wealth.
I've got the congressional switchboard number programmed into the phone and have been pushing single payer till I'm blue in the face. I've started saying forget insurance reform and start investigating/prosecuting torture and lies leading to the crime against humanity, war.
That said, everyone should listen to Evo Morales from Copenhagen.
Bolivian President Evo Morales: “Shameful” For West to Spend Trillions On War and Only $10 Billion For Climate Change
Bolivian President Evo Morales recently arrived in Copenhagen for the UN Climate Summit. In a press conference Wednesday, Morales said, “The budget for the United States is $687 billion for defense and they want for climate change–to save life, to save humanity–they only put up $10 billion. This is shameful.”
From Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/16/bolivian_president_evo_morales_sh...
Kill the Bill
Howard Dean says current health care legislation should be scrapped.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31510813/#34446190
Has anyone mentioned that the 5 worst words in the English language are "A corporation is a person".
I was watching a History Channel show that portrayed the early natives of this land with strangely Caucasian-like features. Of course, this is largely due to the discovery of Kennewick Man, and the wish of many racialist whites to believe that “they” were here first. It is interesting to note that the facial reconstruction of the original skull was not a “coincidence;” Jim Chatters took along the skull bones and a photo of Jean-Luc Picard to a local “artist,” who reconstructed the face to fit Chatters’ “vision.” Facial reconstruction is less science than guess-work, and other reconstructions more closely resemble Native Americans, but what does that matter to the “Whites were here first” crowd? That others have noted that the Chatters' reconstruction also resembles certain north-eastern Indian tribes, and former NBA star Patrick Ewing, are merely annoying details.
The “origin” of Clovis points is also a point of contention, but the whites were here firsters can’t seem to come-up with a rational explanation that accounts for how an estimated 100 million clearly non-Caucasian peoples came to live in the Americas by 1492—a number roughly equal to the population of Europe at the time.
So much for the “brilliant” strategy of lowering the Medicare eligibility. It sounded good for awhile, but we should take it for what it was all along—a useful (albeit brief) dodge for bailing on the public option. I doubt Lieberman was the only senator in the Democratic caucus to oppose the Medicare option, but this arrogant, self-obsessed individual wanted all the “glory” for himself for killing it. Lieberman claims that hospitals in his state complain of lower reimbursements from Medicare, but given deliberately inflated costs for often pointless tests and procedures in the hope of getting as much money as they can, I think this complaint of medical providers can be set aside as other senators were able to do. After all, health care reform is supposed to be about expanding coverage and reigning in costs, and it looks increasingly likely that the senate bill will do neither.
Just in case no one noticed, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell did the courageous thing after the farce of a murder trial with an all-white jury in Shenandoah, requesting that the U.S. Justice Department conduct a civil rights violation investigation of its own. The result yesterday was a federal grand jury handing down indictments on two of the “kids” involved in the racially-motivated murder of Luis Ramirez. The grand jury found evidence that Ramirez had been deliberately targeted, baited and killed because he was a Mexican. But of greater import was the indictment of three Shenandoah police officers—including the police chief—for conspiring to obstruct justice in favor of the killers. The officers are charged with witness and evidence tampering, and lying to FBI investigators. Many whites in Shenandoah still “comfort” themselves by suggesting that because Ramirez was an undocumented worker, he shouldn’t have been in this country to have the opportunity to be killed by their racist youth. The problem, of course, is that this is after the fact; Ramirez was killed because he was a Mexican, not because he was an undocumented worker—and it is despicable to suggest that this would have made any indifference to begin with.
We all fell for the Obama change. Everyone was so fed up with the worst administration in the US history, that Obama looked like a bright shining light. But as early as January of this year I kept hearing from some that Obama would be a centrist at best, and that he will not deliver the progressive goods. Well, Obama was bought and sold long ago. Progressives had no chance. The people had no chance.
For all the hoopla about the historic importance of Obama as a presidential candidate, people forgot that Obama was also being sold to us like a corporate product. His was a campaign as much about the brand of Obama as anything else. The image of Obama became bigger than his substance. But this is how our corporate run political system works, and it should come as no surprise.
If anything, Obama's election has shown that skin color will not matter when our entire political process is captured and flushed with corporate money. Black, white, male or female, by the time a candidate has been "processed" through the political system they are all tamed to serve the purposes of those who own our nation, and it is not the public.